20 Something Rizzles
by wulfgrl58
Summary: AU. The year is 2001. Officer Jane Rizzoli is a rookie cop, making her mark in the Boston Police Department. Doctor Maura Isles is in her final year at BCU Med, all she has to do is make it through her final rotation and she can graduate and begin her Pathology Residency. Fate brings them together, but will their own personalities tear them apart? Stay tuned to find out.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's musings: hello and welcome to my latest project! I am currently in the process of writing a series of fics/ficlets/oneshots that are set in 2001, when our lovely crime-fighting ladies are 25 years old. It came as a random request I stumbled upon whilst on Tumblr, and with the help of my wonderful friend Amanda (manda-belle** **on Tumblr), we have started with project together! If you have a Tumblr, please look up the blog we set up, that is where you will find much more content about this little world I have helped create, the url is 20-something-rizzles .tumblr .com . Here I will just be posting ficlets, I'm writing the ones from Jane's perspective and my partner in crime is gonna be handling Maura's. But this is a much more involved experience, so please check out the blog and tell us what you think! **

Maura Isles excelled in the classroom during her first two years of medical school. Thanks, in part, to her experience in the biology department during her undergraduate years, even biochemistry-the class that most first-year medical school students dreaded-barely posed a challenge for Maura. The key to passing was memorization and hours of studying, which wasn't a problem for Maura. Unlike her peers, the young woman didn't have to worry about finding a balance between her schooling and her social life because school was her only social outlet. She socialized only with her peers and her professors and only in classroom and office settings. While her peers were with friends and significant others, Maura spent her free time studying in the library or at her apartment. Her routine had once made her feel lonely, but as time passed the young doctor's mindset began to change. Each hour spent studying was going to improve her grades and bring her another step closer to accomplishing her goals in life. Additionally, the hours spent studying made the first two years of medical school fly by and it seemed like no time at all between her first day in that biochemistry class and the beginning of her fourth and final year of medical school.

Maura was comfortable in her rotations during her third year, but she knew her fourth year was going to be different, because her fourth year marked the start of her ER rotation. She knew logically that in order to be the best doctor she could be she needed to be well-rounded, and to experience the different sides to the medical field before she should comfortably choose her specialty, but she was dreading this particular rotation. The ER rotation required so much interpersonal interaction. The medicine, the science, facts, all that came easily to the 25-year-old, but she couldn't say the same for talking to people or putting them at ease when they or a loved one were in pain. It wasn't her forte, to say the least.

After a quick speech by the Chief Resident and being assigned a resident to shadow, Maura was off doing rounds. Dr. Grace O'Malley was nice enough, still slightly timid, probably not the best quality in an ER, but Maura appreciated the petite brunette's tendency towards quiet over awkward small talk. As they made their way over to their first patient, the younger doctor started mentally rifling through a multitude of possible greetings for her first ER patient, trying to find the appropriate one. All thoughts of speaking, however, went out the window when she laid eyes on her patient. Holding a balled-up navy blue t-shirt to her head, the uniformed police officer was sitting upright at the edge of the hospital bed, swinging her legs back and forth while she glared at the young officer standing next to her. Her deep brown eyes looked fiercely intent on developing the ability to vaporize her companion, who only smiled good-naturedly in return. The female officer was striking, certainly, but that wasn't what made the freshly-minted doctor speechless. It wasn't the dark curls pushed haphazardly over her shoulders away from the wound on her temple, nor her sharp, angular, slightly flushed facial features, or the way her perfectly shaped lips were pressed into a fine line as she continued to glare at her fellow officer. And it certainly wasn't the trim, muscular, but yet, still feminine, physique that Maura could tell was hidden beneath unflattering navy-blue polyester.

It was the thinly-veiled arrogance, the sense of being all-knowing and invincible, the set of her brow and shoulders that screamed "I do not need something as mortal as a doctor". Maura knew immediately that this was both going to be a difficult patient, and a life-changing one.

"Frost, I'm telling you I don't need to see a fu-" the words died on Officer Rizzoli's lips as she saw the vision coming towards her. She didn't know angels wore light-blue scrubs and lab coats, but this one certainly did. Or maybe it was the concussion talking. She squinted as the doctor came closer, her vision getting blurry and dark as the young doctor approached the bed, chart in hand. The rookie cop just made out the words "My name is Doctor Isles", spoken with a voice like silk before her world started spinning, the sound of blood rushing through her veins pounding in her ears as everything went black.

When Jane came to she was no longer in the busy ER, but a room. The room was brightly lit, smelled strongly of antiseptic, and was completely unremarkable except for one fact: it had the beautiful doctor from earlier leaning on its doorframe, eyes closed as if to attempt the perilous feat of sleeping while standing upright, a skill the officer was sure many med students before her had tried, and failed, to master.

As if on cue the dozing med student was startled awake by a subtle shift in her weight as her body slid along the doorframe. Blinking, she smoothed down her lab coat as if to ensure her momentary rest had not left any evidence behind. Hazel eyes widened as she noticed that her patient was also awake.

"Oh good, you're up" she said, walking over to her patient. Picking up Jane's chart, she scanned it while she continued "we took you for an MRI while you were passed out, and drew some blood as well. Your scan was clean, no sign of any hematoma or bone damage but we're going to keep you overnight and monitor your brain pressure levels, head injuries like yours need to be watched carefully." the doctor paused, waiting for Jane's nod of comprehension before continuing "Dr. O'Malley will be in to go over the details with you once your blood work comes in, but I just wanted to check in and make sure you were okay, Officer Rizzoli"

"Please, call me Jane " the patient answered, extending her hand. Maura took it, shaking it delicately before responding

"I'm Dr. Maura Isles. It's a pleasure to meet you."

**Reviews are super awesome! Especially since this is a new project, I would love some feedback! **


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's musings: hey guys, thank you for the response to chapter one! It's been absolutely amazing starting this new project, and I really appreciate each and every view, follow, fav, and review. I wrote this chapter myself, (Amanda and I co-wrote chapter 1, if I didn't mention that), and I will make sure to specify who wrote what, since Amanda doesn't have an account on this site.**

_July 1, 2001_

Jane spent the rest of that week in a haze. The combination of the pain of her head wound and thoughts of a certain golden-haired med student made Jane distracted and confused most of the time. Fortunately she was stuck at desk duty for the rest of the week, doctor's orders, so there wasn't too much she could possibly mess up .

Jane couldn't wrap her mind around her latest hospital experience. Dr. Isles, Maura, had stopped in every few hours to check on her, making pleasant small talk at each visit , but never delving into anything but the most superficial of topics: the weather, the Red Sox, how long Jane had been a cop, did she like it, etc. Topics meant to distract Jane while Maura examined her and read over her chart. And when it was Jane's turn to ask the questions the doctor gave short, vague answers that really shed no light onto who this woman really was. But Jane's finely tuned cop senses told her that her visitor was purposefully preventing herself from giving away any personal information , possibly in an effort to maintain a professional doctor-patient rapport, but Jane's gut told her it was something else. Did Dr. Isles also feel it? The pull that Jane seemed to have towards the med student, the way she couldn't help but stare at those hazel eyes as they scanned her chart, the way her heart rate noticeably sped up whenever Maura entered the room. It confused the brunette. She had never felt this way about another person before, male or female. When her few female friends in high school and at the academy had talked about swooning, or crushing on a guy "so hard I just forget how to speak sometimes!", Jane had simply nodded, maybe adding a "that totally happens to me too". But the truth was it didn't. Before Maura, Jane had never met somebody that caused her sharp mind, that mind that let her drink a cup of coffee, drive a cruiser, scan oncoming traffic, observe nearby citizens, and talk to her partner all at the same time without missing a beat, the mind that got her accepted to BCU and passed all the BPD written exams with flying colors, stop working. But Maura did. One glimpse of golden hair as she walked past her room, a whisper of her perfume as she had checked Jane's monitors, and every clever thing Jane had thought to say to start a conversation, every topic she thought the doctor might possibly enjoy, all intelligent thought basically, went out the window. Even now, sitting at her desk, staring at the open AIM window on her computer monitor, Jane didn't know what to say. Maura had given Jane her screenname as a way to " keep in contact so I can observe your recovery"

**Author's musings: next up: Maura's perspective, written by my amazing partner-in-crime Amanda!**

**Review, please! I cherish them like Maura cherishes Jane nuzzle-hugs! **

**(also make sure to check out the 20-something-rizzles tumblr page?)**


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